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Recently I came across this Instagram post that in 2015, 17-year old Khanittha Phasaeng from Thailand had been the winner in a national beauty pageant competition called Miss Uncensored News Thailand. More than winning the beauty pageant was the fact that she used to be a garbage collector. She has been helping her mother to collect garbage to support themselves. She also had to give up school, as her mother couldn’t afford her fees. With her mother’s encouragement, she decided to join the beauty competition to get back to school and help support her family. She showed her gratitude towards her mother by kneeling down at her feet with her crown, sash and dress from the competition.

The story is not just about determination but also about where all one can reach even if one does not have the means. I hear from many that one of the biggest impediments to reach a large investment corpus is that they are not able to save enough. I don’t want to sound preachy, but perhaps, we aren’t trying hard enough to save more. We aren’t strict with ourselves when it comes to cap spending. Many a times, we succumb to peer competition and spend to stay their equal. There are extremes where people take credit card overdrafts / loans at a higher interest rate to meet discretionary expenditures like birthdays, anniversaries, travel to expensive locales, buy branded luxury goods, etc. To save more, be brutally honest to yourself and revisit spending habits. Have a monthly budget prescribing the percentage of income to be saved and map this to your future goals. In sum, where there is a will there is a way.